Was Petraeus ousted in a CIA “palace coup”?

posted at 6:01 pm on February 11, 2013 by Allahpundit

This would help solve the lingering mystery of why Paula Broadwell sending snippy anonymous e-mails to Jill Kelley somehow warranted a sustained FBI investigation that led all the way back to the director of the CIA. What if, as the authors of the new book on Benghazi claim, “CIA officers pressured the Justice Department to keep the inquiry open” after the FBI tried to close it?

That’s not the real news here, though. This is:

Petraeus was furious, they say, because he was kept in the dark about the raids being conducted without his knowledge by the Pentagon’s Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) across Libya and North Africa.

Webb and Murphy claim that the September 11, 2012, attack on the U.S. consulate and a CIA outpost in Benghazi proved to Petraeus that he was an outsider in the Obama administration and that he would remain marginalized as long as he was at the CIA.

The central premise of ‘Benghazi: The Definitive Report’ is that the attacks were precipitated by secret raids JSOC had performed in Libya. An attack on the Islamist group Ansar al-Sharia days before September 11 may have been the final straw.

Heavily-armed militants with Ansar al-Sharia attacked the consulate on September 11 as retaliation, the book claims.

Who would have enough authority inside the administration to order special operations raids so secret that not even David Petraeus, the sitting DCIA and former four-star general, would be privy to them? According to the book: John Brennan, formerly Obama’s counterterror czar and currently the nominee to, er, replace Petraeus at CIA. That’s interesting for a few reasons. First, if true, it shows how easy it is for a president to evade the “advise and consent” requirement even for executive appointees who wield tremendous foreign-policy power. The Senate gets to veto the secretary of state and CIA director if it likes, but when it comes to the guy who’s moving JSOC pieces around the global chessboard, nope. So much for accountability.

Second, the idea of O installing Petraeus at CIA while Brennan allegedly went over his head makes me wonder if something similar’s planned for Hagel at defense. Petraeus had political value to Obama insofar as his bipartisan credibility could shield O somewhat on CIA ops. Hagel has … much less credibility, but he still carries the Republican label and can give O some cover that way when the defense cuts start coming. If Brennan really was, shall we say, “supplementing” Petraeus on intelligence, I wonder if, say, Michele Flournoy will be installed somewhere so that she can “supplement” Chuck “I promise to learn more about defense if confirmed” Hagel.

Third, the reason CIA honchos wanted Petraeus out, supposedly, is that he came from a different agency culture (the CIA is notorious for chafing under directors who are outsiders) and because, by emphasizing drone strikes, he steered the agency away from espionage and towards paramilitary activity. But it’s Brennan who, arguably more than anyone else, has been the administration’s point man on drone targeting. He’s the consummate intel insider so he’ll face no resistance of the sort Petraeus did on that count, but unless he can unload drone responsibilities on Hagel and the Pentagon, the CIA’s going to have to get used to its new paramilitary role. I wonder if that’s part of the reason O wants Brennan at the agency now. If anyone can sell them on becoming Team Drone for the indefinite future, it’s him.

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Today’s CIA are a bunch of lawyers, to cover the puerile azzes. The agency has sunk incredibly low, to the detriment of the land.

Obama finished them off.

Brennan…he and Obama are always with their muzzie brothers. Just view the bigger picture. Don’t focus on the Osamas, who’re in the way of the muzzie brotherhood.

The Arab’spring’ is the biggest hoax upon the world. Obama is a charlatanic thug. His brothers flourish, with his aid.

Name one people, I triple dare you, who are freer/free due to Obama. Don’t name Burma, for which he falsely claims credit, and not the Black Panthers, about whom we know already. Also, don’t name any union thugs either.

Name one people, I triple dare you, who are freer/free due to Obama. Don’t name Burma, for which he falsely claims credit, and not the Black Panthers, about whom we know already. Also, don’t name any union thugs either.

Schadenfreude on February 11, 2013 at 6:14 PM

I got you schadenfreude. Democrat connected criminals are all freer due to the dog eater regime.

Corzine walks a free man. He should have been executed for what he did, and I am not engaging in hyperbole. Executed at sunrise in public.

Much is not know or clear about this fellow Brennans role in many things.

Bmore on February 11, 2013 at 6:21 PM

John O. Brennan, Obama’s top terrorism and intelligence adviser is the owner of The Analysis Corp., the firm that was cited in March 2008 for penetrating the files of presidential candidates Barack Obama, Hillary Rodham Clinton, and John McCain in the State Department’s passport office.

At the time of the breach, Brennan was working as an unpaid adviser to the Obama campaign.

Petraeus should have been furious that Obama claimed credit for ending the war in Iraq, when in fact Bush – and Petraeus – ended that war. Obama not only opposed the strategic decision – The Surge – which ended the war, he, like the moron Hagel, cluelessly claimed it would make things worse.

I am furious at the cowards in the GOP who allow Obama to steal Bush’s honor. I am disgusted with Petraeus for allowing himself to be Obama’s dupe. He deserves the disgrace Obama has heaped upon him.

Barky is trying to get rid of any generals whom would protect and defend The Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic. Including the primary danger at present to The Constitution… Obama himself.

That’s why Barky has chosen freaks to like Sebelius, Incompetano, Clintoon-hack Panetta and is trying to get a reject like Hagel in as SecDef.

ohn O. Brennan, Obama’s top terrorism and intelligence adviser is the owner of The Analysis Corp., the firm that was cited in March 2008 for penetrating the files of presidential candidates Barack Obama, Hillary Rodham Clinton, and John McCain in the State Department’s passport office.

At the time of the breach, Brennan was working as an unpaid adviser to the Obama campaign.

Circles within circles.

sharrukin on February 11, 2013 at 6:25 PM

And the guy who was co-operating with the federales investigating that wound up dead in his car.

Talk to John Brennan and ask him the questions that need to be asked. Patreaus was set up and was chosen for the the job beacause of his extra marital activity. Brennan needed a patsy and he and Obama found the perfet one. Providing weapons for all of the Arab Spring is an illeagal activity. It blurs the lines between friends and enemies. John Brennan and Barack Hussein Obama are indeed our enemies. This is what I have thought for the last 24 hours. I just wonder if I am right.

Brennan is an opportunist, a boot licker and a snake. Not to mention a liar, when lying is expedient.

Petreus was a fool to accept the CIA appointment. It was a WH setup to destroy him and meanwhile to take him out of the loop. The WH had the goods on him from the start, and intended to play the Broadhurst card to finish him off.

Foreign policy is being dictated by the WH. Sec of State and Sec of Defense take their orders from Obama and his WH advisors. Libya was Obama’s baby, and since the Benghazi attack was precipitated by secret raids JSOC had performed in Libya, it was proof of the backlash and failure of that operation. The disaster lay squarely at the feet of the WH, hence the attempt to deflect blame to the amateur video.

Panetta’s job at the hearings was to distance Obama from events surrounding Benghazi, to protect him from much more serious, possibly impeachable damage that will follow when more details of that operation come to light.

Brennan is an opportunist, a boot licker and a snake. Not to mention a liar, when lying is expedient.

Petreus was a fool to accept the CIA appointment. It was a WH setup to destroy him and meanwhile to take him out of the loop. The WH had the goods on him from the start, and intended to play the Broadhurst card to finish him off.

petefrt on February 11, 2013 at 6:54 PM

I hate to break this to you but Petraeus is every bit as much an opportunist, boot licker, and snake as Brennan.

You don’t need a conspiracy. What you have is a bunch of people there whom Petraeus had antagonized. Coup? well no, because there was no lead. It was just a lot of people on board who didn’t like the buy.

If you really are into these things you understand that Patraeus has really really bad tradecraft, that is he did not protect himself, and by extension the people he worked with, from obloquy.

As Charles McCarry put it, who had worked as a singleton for them,”The world doesn’t care what you do as long as you respect the feelings of others.”

P-diddle didn’t and they got him. If nothing else he was arrogant with this person life and you can’t smoke in a gunpowder plant.